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Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Have I ever told you I love unicorns? I love them pretty much indiscriminately. From the bad ass stab-every-one-who-gets-in-my-way Medieval ones, to the glittery pink rainbow and dreams ones, to the somewhere-in-the-middle tacky 1970's ones that are so often found decoupaged and shellacked onto slices of wood ones. Recently, I was lurking around the local Goodwill when I saw an older woman walk by with a huge wooden picture/clock of the 1970's variety featuring unicorns in a magical glen, it took so much of my will power not to shout "Look over there!" while I stole the clock from her cart and made a run for the register. I was so jealous. But I'm not really here today to tell you about the awful and mean things I would do to old ladies in the name of unicorns, instead, I want to showcase some of my favorite handmade unicorn themed things from Etsy!

The unicorn I probably am most fond of is the unicorn of the Medieval variety. I love it for it's strangeness, it sometimes looks hardly anything like the typical horse-with-a-horn styled unicorn that is depicted nowadays, and I love it for its aforementioned bad-assery. It's never shown running along glittering rainbows into dream land. The Medieval unicorn is either peacefully content being it's bad ass self, or about ready to stab someone with it's horn.

So I have a couple of beat up old unicorn related books. Want to read something interesting about unicorns? Check out this page with a brief history of unicorns throughout the ages.

I would love to create some new jewelery pieces featuring the unicorn, both the girly glittery kind, and the more regal kind. I am not exactly sure how I want to go about doing this, but I do have a few ideas floating around, from sculpting my own unicorn head and making a mold around it and making my own custom cabochons (something I've been waiting to try ever since I started casting resin) or maybe something simpler, like featuring unicorn art in some resin brooches.

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Whenever I get a new resin mold I tend to "test it out" by making a batch of glitter filled pieces. Which, generally, is a pretty bad idea because that means the next time I want to use them I have to carefully make sure I get every single piece of glitter off, which I never can manage. But this time around, I bought a set of molds specifically for filling with rainbow glitter. An alphabet mold!

Fresh out of the mold, and full of extra bits that need to be carefully removed!

A while ago online I stumbled across an alphabet mold, and by the time I realized oh God, I need that, it was all sold out, so I had to hunt down another place selling the same one, which turned into a much bigger task than I imagined, as nearly everywhere only sold a significantly larger and fancier alphabet mold, while I wanted the small, simple letters. After several days of searching and actually emailing and messaging some sellers who had previously sold the set, I found a shop that was just so happening to make an order of molds and was going to add on the alphabet set for me. Awesome.

The letters came out pretty great, but were sort of a pain to fill. I had to carefully "paint" the resin in with a pour stick, and even a single drip out of the mold created a big pointy mess just waiting for me to have to file down later. Oh well, hopefully it's worth it!

What do I plan on doing with this ridiculously glittery letters? Inspired more by the fairy kei side of things, and this awesome little Hello Kitty cell phone strap that I am saving for just the right moment, I want to make some purse/phone straps with words on them. Hopefully it works out, hopefully the little letters are strong enough, and hopefully I can find my awesome little hand drill, because I have been doodling the different things I want to make with these resin pieces in my notebook for a few weeks now!

Sunday, September 25, 2011

When it comes to jewelry and decor, I love a sort of mysterious and romantic antique aesthetic. Something dark and dusty, yet full of wonder. Which is why I was pleasantly surprised to stumble across Sweet Ruin's Etsy shop on a late night Etsy expedition for amazing masks.

Not only does Sweet Ruin make some amazingly decadent masks, fit for a opulent Rococo or Victorian masquerade (that are, sadly a bit out of my monthly mask budget), but they also offer a variety of jewelry pieces and even art and some stunningly gorgeous hand fans.

I've also recently discovered Heartsy! What is Heartsy, and how does it work, you ask? Basically, it's a place for select Etsy shops to post special sales where you can get between %50 and even %70 or higher a percent off your purchase from them. They offer a limited number of vouchers at a discounted price that are good for a sometimes astronomically large amount of store credit. If you're a VIP member of Heartsy you can get even more of a discount on some sales. The shops change on a day-to-day basis, so there's always something new to be tempted into buying.

I paid for a month of it to test it out a bit, and currently I am loving it. I've bought 3 vouchers that in total cost me $40 (including my month's subscription) and have gotten $80 worth of vouchers. I have a feeling I'll be giving out a lot of handmade stuff for Christmas this year!

Will I keep my subscription for a second month? Maybe, I really don't know yet, it all depends whether or not I think I'm going a little bit spend crazy with stuff I don't really need but just can't resist or what. Although, I am considering possibly offering a sale in my own Etsy shop through Heartsy, I've just got to get it a little bit more filled up.

Saturday, September 24, 2011

Long time, no blogging! I am hoping to remedy that with a whole bunch of new posts about what I've been up to, and better yet, what I've been making. I hope you all didn't forget about me while I was gone!

I have blogged on here before about the Brimfield Market that I have been going to since I was little, and I had intended to blog about back in May, when I went for the first time this year. But, I had come back with a total of 2 pictures and absolutely nothing. So, I decided to have another go at it for the year, and went up at the beginning of this month for the final, September, Brimfield of the year. I am happy to say I took a ton more pictures than I did last time, and even came home with a bunch of great stuff!

I'll save showing off what I got for next time! As usual, I was pretty thrifty and didn't spend more than $10 on a single thing!